Cultural Diversity and Global Media: The Mediation of Difference

Cultural Diversity and Global Media  explores the relationship between the media and multiculturalism. Maintaining that the media actively shapes and constructs understandings of cultural difference, rather than reflecting debates on cultural diversity, Siapera argues that we must look to the media in order to understand cultural diversity and its position in society.  Through a thorough analysis of the complexity of the media, Siapera examines the processes of production, representation and consumption of mediated cultural diversity, including the changes in the media landscape introduced by the internet. Moving toward a more holistic understanding of the media and their embeddedness in society, politics and culture, Cultural Diversity and Global Media constitutes an interrogation of mediated cultural difference.

1. (Re)thinking Cultural Diversity and the Media 1.1. The Crises of Multiculturalism 1.2. The Mediation of Cultural Diversity 1.3. The Structure of the Book 2. Theorizing the Nation 2.1. Theories of the Nation 2.2. A Word on Globalization 2.3. Conclusions 3. Varieties of Multiculturalism 3.1. A Typology of European Multiculturalism 3.2. Multiculturalism in Immigration Countries: US and Canada 3.3. Constitutively Different: India and Nigeria 3.4. Conclusions 4. Theories of Multiculturalism 4.1. Multicultural Dilemmas 4.2. Essentialism or Fluidity? 4.3. Universalism or Particularism? 4.4. Recognition or Redistribution? 4.5. Conclusions 5. Media Theories and Cultural Diversity 5.1. Socio–Psychological Approaches to Media 5.2. Medium Theory 5.3. Political–Economic Theories of the Media 5.4. Socio–Cultural Approaches to the Media 5.5. Mediation: The Difference Media Make 5.6. Conclusions 6. Media Production and Diversity 6.1. Media Production and Mediation 6.2. Media Corporations 6.3. Media Organizations and Media Logics 6.4. Media Workers 6.5. Conclusions 7. Minority and Diasporic Media: Controversies and Contributions 7.1. Why Study Minority Media? 7.2. Issues of Terminology 7.3. Theorizing the Role(s) of Diasporic Media 7.4. Diasporic Media: a Typology 7.5. The Politics of Diasporic Media 7.6. Conclusions 8. Theories of Representation 8.1. The Work of Representation 8.2. Stereotyping: the Cognitive Aspects of Representation 8.3. Framing and Discourse: a First Link to Ideology 8.4. Semiosis, Discourse, and Representation: an Historical Analysis 8.5. The Performative Force of Representation 8.6. Conclusions: Representation and Mediation 9. Regimes of Representation 9.1. The Multiplicity of Representations 9.2. The Racist Regime of Representation 9.3. The Domesticated Regime of Representation 9.4. The Regime of Commodification 9.5. Conclusions 10. Self–Representations of Cultural Diversity 10.1. Representational Dilemmas 10.2. The Essentialist Regime of Representation 10.3. The Alternative Regime of Representation 10.4. Conclusions 11. Audiences and Cultural Diversity 11.1. What Do People Do with the Media? 11.2. Audience Reception of Mediated Cultural Diversity 11.3. Ethno–Cultural Groups as Audiences 11.4. Media Consumption and Identity 11.5. Right to Reply: How Can Audiences Respond? 11.6. Conclusions 12. Cultural Diversity Online 12.1. The Difference the Internet Makes 12.2. Network Society and Cultural Diversity 12.3. Mediation of Cultural Diversity Internet Style 12.4. Conclusions Bibliography Index

Eugenia Siapera is lecturer in Media and Communications at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. She is the author (with Lincoln Dahlberg) of Radical Democracy and the Internet (2007) and (with Joss Hands) At the Interface (2004).

"It is easy to read, clearly written and well organised". (Times Higher Education Supplement, 4 November 2010)